Never take a present from a stranger ....

..... let alone joining him/ her into their house. That is definitively something that I will tell my children. Yesterday however, I did not really lead by example. On our way back home, we found a cute little bistro in an unknown (to us) little village. While waiting for our food, Junia and I decided to take a stroll. We saw a strange black castle-like building and decided to head for it. Inside were a lot of motorbikes and we entered to have a closer look. Junia was a little afraid of all the skulls and hell-like creatures but liked the bikes. When I heard someone coughing, I turned around and saw two heavily tatood guys with long hair starring at us. It was then that I realised I had done something not so clever. When I, in a mixture of English an Portuguese tried to explain that we were just there to look for the motorbikes, I all of a sudden understood the skulls and hell-like creatures. We had entered the headquater of the local chapter of the Nomads. Oops! Junia was the one who obviously smoothened-up both gentlemen and they seemed relaxed with our presence. When they understood that we 'came in peace', they showed us some of their bikes. Their master pieces was a six wheel hummer like motorbike. When I sat on it, it  gave me the 'born to be wild' feeling and it was a good Kodak moment. Food was calling and I left with a sweaty t-shirt and made some new friends.

Back in the car

Now we are on the road again, driving from Canela back to Floripa, roughly 6 hours drive. Even if we have been in rather touristy areas we have not seen one single European so far. 

Southeastern Brazil is rather well-off, as a difference to Stockholm there are no beggars in the streets. Amazing houses, fantastic restaurants, super clean, good roads... very easy to travel in! Have not even been considering any culture shock. And the friendlyness of the people never stops to amaze me. It is also the perfect country for travelling with children: good play grounds, buffet restaurants where you can be as picky as you like, and again, these amazing Brazilians who always are chatting up Junia and Alma. To keep it short: we like it here!

So, what has happened since last time I wrote? We have done some more hiking, in the place
we did our first hike together a Sunday 8 years back. Did not remember the hike to be so tough though, but then it maybe wasn't 30+ degrees, Justus did not have a kicking 16 kg Junia on his back and I did not have a 6kg Alma in a 5 m wrap on my chest.

 After half the way (only downhill, as steep as it made Bengtsbacken seem as flat as Holland) we realized that the one hour that was indicated on the board for the track was very very optimistic. But we survived, and had a well deserved massive fika afterwards. 

We have also spent more time with our friends from Sao Leopoldo, enjoying culdinary delights as köttbullar (with björnbärssylt instead of lingon, man tager vad man haver. Funkade helt ok, men så var det inget socker i heller.) äppelpaj, (basically following the same strategy as the cooking competition in Japan, remember Anders?) pannekoeken met spek, stroop en appel and delicious pao de queixo. 

Junia and Carolina

Close-up with a tucan in Gramado zoo. Bloody scary beak.

Ana, Flavio and Alminha. Oh, how nice it is to have someone to hold your baby so that you can eat with two hands! :)

Happy backpackers...

These middle of the day naps are unfortunately getting more uncommon.

Junia enjoying pancake on a stick

When you are out of Hello Kitty bandaids (ve och fasa), pappa Justus needs to be creative.

Sometimes Alma is not so fond of being picked up by random strangers in restaurants as her parents are.

The only negative thing we can say about last week is the problem we had with mosquitos. Justus the mosquito matador went hunting one evening, collecting his prey in the toilet.

In Brasilian Germany

Oi!

After a fantastic weekend with a former colleague of Justus and his family (Brazilians must be the friendliest people on earth AND the temperature dropped to 25) we are now in Canela, in a very German/ Swiss looking part of Brasil.

Junia and her mother likes the buffets very much. Junia especially likes that her parents have softened regarding their sugar talibanism, and now she can (almost) go crazy on the dessert table.

Parque do Caracol

The stairs to the bottom of the waterfall were equivalent to a 131 m high building. Justus had Junia on his back...

We have located the pancake-on-a-stick-place where we said our first hello 8 years ago, and will tomorrow visit the park we shared a taxi to by then (when I could not remember Justus' name and called him strössel (hagelslag) from his strange breakfast habits.) Today we have been hiking, eating chocolate and killing mosquitos.

Anna Blomgren - do you remember the wedding we went to here?

Ate a proxima Floripa!

Now we have been in Brazil for a week, but Stockholm feels ages away. The weather has been a little bit on the hot side, 35-38 degrees and if my head in normal conditions works a bit slow due to waking up every 2 hours at night, in this temperature it feels like it's filled with kvicksilver. Our fantastic little ladies don't complain however. Junia only protests when she needs to get out of the swimming pool.

We have a also been to the beach! Alma was not too impressed, and Junia still prefers the swimmingpool...

Our first home exchange has reached it's end, and now I am even more positive about this vacation way than before. Apart from staying in a fully equipped home without any other tourists in the neighbourhood, we also spent half a day with the owners. Junia got a new best friend and we learnt a lot about the Brazilian society as a result.

Due to the high temperature we sometimes chose to spend the afternoon in an airconditioned shopping mall rather than a beach with cristalline water and white powder sand. Better fika in shopping malls. 

And then Junia has got her first haircut! Don't worry mormor, the curls are still there...

We have also seen some of Brazil's fauna, in the wild...

The last night we spent in a beautiful eco lodge (thank you Joao via Carin and Erik for the tip!) and now we continue via a former colleague of Justus' to Canela - where we first met.

Arrived!

I am now eating increadible sweet Brazilian sweets (sugar, peanuts, coco and some sort of syrup) listening to Junia singing in the room next door (not snoring unfortunately). We arrived yesterday to Floripa, e tudo bem! 

The trip started 3.30 in the morning early Friday, and 5 minutes after we got into the taxi Junia threw up big time. Could it have been the evil bug 4 of her dagismates had the last day in kindergarden? Hard to tell, she gave another cascade just when we landed in Sao Paolo and nr 2 has been pure water since this night. Her 'allmäntillstånd' is well though, jumping, running, never stops talking. She is not keen on eating unfortunately, but have at least drunk a l of milk since yesterday. 

The flights went better than we had dared to imagine, even had time to see two movies! The girls were fantastic, hardly complaining at all even if the eat and sleep pattern was totally screwed. One night in Sao Paolo, and finally, after almost 40 hours of travelling we landed in our first homeexchange in Floripa. Washing mashine and swimmingpool, a paradise!

Travelling with children in Brazil is like walking around with two massive VIPcards or a platinum card at the airport. No need to stand in any line! I also came to remember the feeling when we came back to Stockholm after New Zealand "why are people ignoring my child?" Here they are just as child friendly as in the kiwi country, or maybe it's just swedes that are fed up with strollers.

Now we have given up this nap time for Junia (Alma is luckily sleeping), proxima destinacao: a praia!

Photos from leaving Arlanda: Justus always have an exiting adventure at Starbucks - what's his name? Junia got her milk.

No north photos 2

Junia wwoofing, sitting (a few seconds) and beaching!

No north photos 1

Problems uploading... Caves and sleep train in the rain.